


By The Fire

by HeidiBug731



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Angst, F/M, angry kisses
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-11
Updated: 2018-09-11
Packaged: 2019-07-10 23:25:27
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,701
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15959792
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HeidiBug731/pseuds/HeidiBug731
Summary: A random scene in my head I felt the need to write out. Solas joins up with Lavellan and party for some unknown reason in some unknown location in D4. Things are awkward. Angry kissing. Sex and angst (so much angst!). Dorian is pissed.





	By The Fire

She can almost convince herself it’s like old times; sitting at camp with the Inquisition, battling Venatori and red templars in a dense forest.

But she’s in Tevinter, not Ferelden or Olais. Dorian’s pretense is familiar, but Vaea’s is relatively new. She’s missing half her left arm, and the meager stew they eat lacks it’s usual flair.

She's always been the one who could turn boring porridge into something spectacular. But her usual foraging skills failed her this night. Her mind is elsewhere, and she hasn’t been able to stop her fingers from shaking. She gathered plants blindly and returned to camp after too short a hunt, fully expecting to come back and find him gone once again.

But he had not gone. 

Solas sits beside her, sipping from his bowl. He wears a simple tunic and trousers, not like what he’d worn when with the Inquisition. These garments are thinner, the barest underclothes of his sentinel armor – except for the leg wraps, which are exactly as she remembers.

No one speaks. Dorian, who sits on a perpendicular log with Vaea shoots a few scrutinizing glances at Solas. But the meal passes in silence. And though there are things she’d like to say, they jumble together in her throat. She can barely look at the elf beside her.

“You need more firewood,” Solas says when their bowls are finished and no one has moved.

She glances at the single dying log in the fire and realizes he’s right. “Dorian, will you and Vaea collect some, please?”

The mage’s eyebrows shoot upward, his eyes wide with alarm and concern. But she nods to him, and he pulls a confused Vaea into the trees.

Even with the two of them gone, she continues to stare down at her bowl.

“Whatever you need to say,” he tells her. “You can say it.”

“I don’t even know where to start,” she admits, bitterness filling her voice.

“Start with what you’re thinking.”

She lets out a long exhale and stands, dropping her bowl by the log. She walks to the opposite edge of the fire and turns around. For the first time since they set camp, she takes in the whole of him.

There is much of the Solas she knew: his rigid body posture, the gentle look in his eyes… but he is also more. Underneath everything she finds so familiar and comfortable, there is something else she has only begun to understand; something that adds weight to the proud way he sits, to the question he holds in his eyes, to the feelings of rage and sorrow that climb up her throat.

“Did it mean anything?” she asks him, her voice shaking. “Any of it?”

The space between his eyebrows crinkle.

“Me,” she clarifies. “And Dorian.” She points toward the trees. “And all the other members of the Inquisition. Did we mean anything to you? Or were we all just pawns to use against Corypheus?”

He shakes his head. “You know the answer to that.”

“ _Do I?!_ ” she steps toward him and he leans back. He, the Dread Wolf, flinches in the face of her demands.

It should tell her something, give her the answers to the burning questions in her heart. And perhaps it does because she turns away, angry tears coming to her.

“Why?” she asks, wiping at her eyes “Why did you..?”

She can’t finish, but Solas answers anyway. “I loved you.”

She spins around and strides toward him. “Don’t say that! Don’t you dare!”

He stands. “What do you want me to say? That I used you for my own sadistic pleasure? Would that help you?”

“Yes!”

He stares at her, his face twisted in his own anger and frustration. And for a moment, she thinks he’ll say it, he’ll give her what she needs to hate him. But his features soften, and she reminds herself that nothing with him is ever that easy.

“I’m sorry,” he says, and the heartache in the lines of his face makes her anger rise again.

He turns from her, but she gabs him and pulls him back, spinning him around. It’s the look of acceptance in his eyes, of defeat, that makes her bite back her anger, gritting her teeth. She could yell and scream at him, and he would take it. She could spit in his face, and he would do nothing.

It infuriates her that he won’t fight back, that he won’t give her something to push against.

So she kisses him instead, crushing her mouth to his with such force the inside of her lip splits against her teeth. His mouth opens in a gasp, and she forces her tongue inside, pressing into him, searching for the furthest depths she can penetrate. Her fingers dig into his arm as she pulls him closer.

His hands press into her hips, and he kisses her so hard their teeth knock together. She pulls back to drag her teeth along his bottom lip. He returns the gesture, biting at her upper lip. His arms wrap around her waist, and she drags her nails down his shoulder. He does the same along her lower back.

This is what she wanted, something to fight with, something to hit back as hard as she hit on. And when her anger and frustration are spent, she pulls away to look at him. His lips are swollen, his face flushed, and his eyes alight. She _loves_ him like this, his wall of cool control finally broken down.

His bottom lip is busted, and she presses her tongue to the wound before kissing it. She is gentle, tender. And when he kisses her back with equal softness, she finds herself wanting things to be like they were, back when she loved him with all her heart, back when things were far less complicated. And when she pulls him closer, there is no anger, only warmth and affection.

The longer they kiss, the more she desires other things. But when she curls her fingers into the waist of his trousers and pulls their hips together, he pushes back.

“No, _vhenan_. I’ve hurt you enough.”

She shakes her head. “I don’t care.”

She closes the distance between them and slides her hands between his thighs.

He sighs, leaning his forehead on hers. “ _Vhenan_.”

She strokes him till he’s hard against his trousers and he leaves her forehead to trail kisses down her neck. She fumbles with the tie while he works on the field gear around her waist she never bothered to remove since setting camp.

She makes an impatient whimper in the back of her throat.

* * *

“So you’re saying,” says Vaea behind him. “That the Inquisitor and Fen’Harel – the ancient elven god hellbent on destroying the world – were once… together? _How?_ ”

Dorian bends to pick up a fallen branch. “It’s complicated.”

“Are you sure we should have left her alone with him?”

He examines the thin branch, breaks it in half by standing on it and adds both pieces to the pile of wood in his arms. “Trust me. It’s far more concerning what would have happened if we hadn’t left them alone.”

Vaea chuckles. “She’s not that scary.”

Dorian shakes his head. “You don’t know her well enough yet.” He jumps. “What was that?”

A sound came on the air. He thought-

“There! Did you hear that?”

“Erm… Dorian-”

“It’s coming from camp.”

“Dorian - wait!”

He drops the wood from his arms and runs, his hand reaching for the staff slung across his back. As he nears the camp site, he hears the sound again: a low moan.

He breaks through the trees and comes to a sudden stop at the sight before him.

At first, he thinks something terrible has happened, that Lavellan has been injured or worse as Solas lays over her, shielding her or attacking her.

But then he hears the moan again, and Lavellan raises her head to press her mouth against Solas’. The scene before him sifts with new meaning.

He takes a reflexive step back as he realizes his mistake, complicated by the fact neither of them bothered to remove most of their clothing.

Lavellan leans her head back, giving an audible sigh, and Dorian spins around, his brain remembering how to move his feet. He presses his hands to his ears as he hurries back into the trees.

Vaea approaches him, her hesitant stance and questioning gaze telling him she knew what was happening far earlier than he did.

“Right.” He’s unable to meet her eyes or shake the image of what he’d just seen from his mind. “What were we doing?”

“Gathering twigs?”

“Yes, that.” He shakes his head. “Let’s get back to it.”

Vaea scoffs. “Are you serious?”

Dorian gestures toward camp. “Do you want to interrupt them?!”

When she doesn’t move, he strides passed her, running a hand over his face as he peers into into the underbrush. “Well, don’t just stand there. Help me.”

She shifts the bundle in her arms. “Help you with what?”

“I left a perfectly good pile of…” He clears his throat. “Wood around here somewhere.”

* * *

Being with her again is every bit as incredible as he remembers, more so in that he’d never thought it would happen again. And when they’re spent in each other’s arms, he finds her lips and kisses her. He wants nothing to take away this moment, nothing to rob him of this feeling that there is no force that could tear them apart.

But as he smiles down at her, his thumb stroking her cheek, reality begins to sink in. He notes it as the wonder dies from her eyes. They are still at odds with one another, and one passionate tussle – in the dirt no less – doesn’t change that.

He stands, mentally chastising himself. This was a mistake. He’d known better than to give in to his desire for her, yet he’d done it anyway. True, she’d coaxed him, but he should have been strong enough…

And now he’d hurt her, just as he’d known he would.

She won’t look at him as they readjust their clothing. She sits by the fire and runs her hand over her face. He doesn’t sit next to her. Instead, he stands behind her, wishing there was something he could say, something he could do to make this easier.

Dorian and Vaea return, their arms laden with fuel for the fire. Dorian glares at him with a piercing intensity, and Solas realizes he knows what happened. And there is nothing he can say or do in his defense.

“I’m going to bed,” Lavellan announces.

She rises and strides to her tent, not stopping to glance at Solas though he reaches out a hand to – to what? Stop her? Tell her he’s sorry? As if words could fix everything he’s put her through…

“I think I’ll retire too,” says Vaea quickly, dropping her wood by the fire and striding swiftly to her own tent.

He’s left with Dorian, who deposits his pile on top of Vaea’s and crosses his arms, glaring daggers.

Solas sighs, “Just say it.”

“Haven’t you done enough?” Venom drips from his voice.

Solas shakes his head in perfect agreement that he’s done far too much. “What do you want me to do, Dorian?”

Dorian uncrosses his arms and strides toward him. “I want you to pack up your tent and your fancy armor and go. I want you to never contact her again, never touch her, never look at her, never breathe her name, never let another thought of her cross your mind. And when she’s forgotten you and lived a full and joyous life in spite of the hell you’ve put her through, then _maybe_ I’ll be satisfied.”

Solas averts his gaze from Dorian’s fury. He swallows and nods. “You’re right. That’s exactly what I should do.”

“Then by the Void, why don’t you?”

Solas gives a bitter laugh and shakes his head again. “Because I am a moth, and she is a flame.” He looks back at her tent with longing, knowing full well he shouldn’t. “You’d all be better off if I just burned up and let that be the end of it.”

If Dorian reacts to his statement, he doesn’t notice. He sighs as he strides to his tent. He’d pitched it right next to hers like the fool he is. He enters, kicks his armor aside, and curls up in his bedroll.

He never should have involved her in this, never should have involved any of them. But he’d thought… well, it doesn’t matter what he’d thought. He made a thorough mess of things, and that’s all that matters.

A high pitched, muffled sound reaches his ears, and he raises his head from his pillow. It sounds again and again, and…

_F_ _enedhis! Is she crying?_

He can hear it clearly now. Muffled, as though she were pressing her face to something to mute the sound, but there could be no mistaking it.

He curses himself as he lays back down. He did this to her, and now… He wants to go to her, to wrap his arms around her and cradle her. He wants to soothe her tears with kisses and gentle words and caresses.

But he gave up his right to comfort her a long time ago. And he’s probably the last person she wants right now.

He pulls his blanket over his head, trying to drown out the sound, but there is no relief from it. He sighs, accepting his punishment. He pulls his blanket back down and lays there, listening to her cries. Tears fall from his own eyes.

Dorian’s right. He should go. He should leave her. For once since he’d met her, he should do the right thing.

He rises, gathers up his armor, and steps outside his tent to put it on. It’s the clinking of the metal that draws her out to meet him.

“Are you leaving?”

He can’t tell if the hurt in her voice is from the pain he recently left her or if it’s new, if seeing him pack up his gear makes her hurt all over again.

“ _Vhenan…_ ” He looks into her shinning eyes and realizes he does not have the will.

He sets his armor aside and steps to her, taking her tear-streaked face into his hands. “I have never had the resolve to be as strong as you needed me to be,” he explains. “That day when you first kissed me, I should have let you walk away. I should have never gotten you involved in this.” He takes a breath and continues. “I should go, but I need you to tell me to because I can’t…” He swallows back the emotion rising in his throat. “Tell me to go. Tell me you never want to see me again. Tell me your life would be better off without me. Please.”

She looks into his face, her eyes wide and swimming, and he has no idea what’s going through her mind. All he knows, is she has this one chance to free herself.

“Please, _vhenan_ ,” he says.

She lays her hand against his face and kisses him, the salt from her tears on her lips. And he accepts this. This is what goodbye should taste like, sweet and bitter all at once. This is what he will remember.

Then she pulls away from him, her hand dropping to his neck, and he waits for the words.

“Don’t go.”

His heart drops into his stomach like a rock, and he leans against her as his world spins.

She squeezes his shoulder and whispers again, “Don’t go.”

He shakes his head is disbelief.

She takes his hand, and he obeys as she leads him into her tent.

They lay together, their arms wrapped firmly around each other, and he can’t stop the tears falling from his eyes.

“I love you,” she whispers against his chest where her own tears are soaking the fabric of his tunic.

It’s the greatest curse he ever could have given her, and he has no idea how she can choose to carry it.

“ _Ar lath ma, vhenan_.”

**Author's Note:**

> [original tumblr post](https://liaragaming.tumblr.com/post/171805141338)   
> 


End file.
